Digital

sketchbook
By: Yelena
Introduction-week 1-4
Tonal work
introduction
Reflection
During the first week we worked on shading and pencil control.
I think my piece is quite pretty and i like how the lines on the
flower go from darker to light and back to dark again but i think
in the shaded sections i could’ve used a darker pencil like 7b
since i only used hb-6b.
Water colours
This lesson we were
experimenting with water
colours and the colour wheel. I
think the saturation of the
colours were well represented
but they were runny and hard to
work with. I think i would switch
to gouache paints since they are
a like a mix of watercolor and
acrylic and they won’t add
creases to the paper.
Tonal and water colour piece
(I can’t remember what it was called.)
This piece was a mix of working with
watercolor/acrylic and tones with pencil.
I think that the image itself is quite
emotional since it depicts a boy drawn in
detail but sitting on empty land. It shows
that he is too detailed to be with the
doodles stick figures but not detailed
enough to be with the sky which is the
only thing that’s full of life and colourful. I
like how i used a range of shades and
wacky shapes to fill the sky (hb-7b
pencils were used). If i were to do it again
i think i would have made the dividing
lines more pronounced and used an
8b/9b pencil to add areas of extreme
darkness though i could not find one.
 Sculpture mind mapping
Themes- spiral, opening, hold
Opening a new chapter in
Opening up to someone Opening paint bottles your life
Butterfly coming out of a
Opening your mind to new
cocoon
things
Flowers blooming
opening Opening in the sky i.e
Opening a book silver lining on clouds
A nut shell being opened

eggs/ shells being cracked

open
Seed pod opening
Opening your eyes Birthday presents Going through an open
doorway
 Sculpture mind mapping
Themes- spiral, opening, hold
hypnotism
Fingers drawing spirals

Whirlpools in water
tornadoes

Spiralling out of control

spiral Feeling dizzy

fear
A nut shell being opened Snail shells
twisting

hallucinations
mazes
puzzles
 Sculpture mind mapping
Themes- spiral, opening, hold
Holding a bouquet of
flowers
Holding in emotions
Holding an animal

Holding a door for hold Holding back tears

someone

bags
Holding an egg in your hands
baskets
Being held in a cage
Holding your feelings in
Opening sculpture/review

Unfortunately, my sculpting clay hadn’t

arrived by the time we did this so i had to
improvise and use a flour based clay.I
think a butterfly coming out of a cocoon is
a good symbol for opening and new
beginnings. Flour clay is difficult to shape
since it can barely stand on its own but if i
was to do this again i would use the brown
sculpting clay which is more sturdy and
easier to work with.
Module 1
Cabinets of curiosity
 Lead lesson starter sketch
The image depicts a
bird working an
office job,doing
taxes while there is
a whole other world
of people and
planes inside of
him.
Joy Broom
A closer look
review
I think that overall this research page
was very good even though it was
difficult to find information about
Joy Broom’s life and date of birth (which
is roughly 1924. I think the creative
pieces represented her art style well but
if i was to paint them again i would use
oil paint instead of gouache because it
bled a lot when i added water and dried
almost instantly. (you can re-wet
gouache but i didn't use watercolour
paper so there was a higher risk of rips)
 Symbolism and random pairings
These are a couple of the ● string
random items i found around ● Dior sunglasses
my house to start with. ● Wooden elephant
In the image you can see ● 2 Seashells in a
(left to right horizontally) cork jar
● Nail file ● Disposable glove
● Match box
● Compact mirror
● Rose quartz tree
● Beats by dre
headphones
● Earrings
● Ring
● Makeup brush
● Clay penguin
● Ash tray (with
sandalwood, incense
and crystals)
● Jewellry box
Analysis
I think that even though these items are
“random” they all portray similar meanings. I
noticed that a lot of the objects were circular
which could represent the circle of life/ the
lifecycle of a teenager. A lot of the objects are
crystals which are usually used in meditation
and healing.
 Pairing 1
Sunglasses and
string
I think that the sunglass symbolise the
exciting things in life and enjoying it to
the fullest while the string could
symbolise not wanting to let go of your
past. This is because the glasses are old
dior from around the 90’s and they were
discontinued which could show that you
had an exciting youth but you don’t want
to put it behind you as you grow older
which is why you are using the string as
a tie to make sure your old habits don’t
die..
 If you look at the gloves with the
ashtray and crystals then you’re
being foolish by protecting Pairing 2
yourself from something
harmless and healing since Headphones, glove
ashtrays are usually used to put and ashtray I think that the gloves symbolise
out cigarettes which are harmful
protecting yourself from
and crystals are known to have
something that is completely
healing properties which is why it
harmless (like germaphobes or
would be strange for you to not
clean freaks). If you look at it
want it.
with the headphones (which are
old and slightly
I think the pair is depicting someone worn out) you could be trying to
not wanting to accept change and protect yourself from aging and
growth because they’re afraid of
losing your youth.
unaware of the benefits of change
because if you don’t do anything
different in life you will never learn
anything new
Lisa milroy

I believe that this is a well written artist research page.It was

slightly easier to write about the artist’s life because there was
more information available to me than with Joy Broom.
I decided to use one page instead of two and leave blank
spaces to recreate the negative space that Lisa Milroy uses in
her art. If i was to do it again i think i would opt for two pages
instead of one because my handwriting had to be condensed
more than i would have wanted it to be.
Closer look
Closer look pt.2
 Planning
Assemblage piece

I knew for my first assemblage i wanted to have a double sided symbalage like
“emotion and logic” in my piece so i went around my garden collecting colourful
flowers and leaves to use. (with my mums permission of course)
 Themes and ideas

Collect organic items for

heart “flowers, leaves etc” Use clay because of
organically dull colour

Collage the flowers Collect already dead

together Assemblage piece
insects

Issues amongst society

Brain and heart
Women’s self
worth Jealousy manipulation
beauty
mirrors Tied pairs
Makeup Being held back by others
Self image
 “Brain and heart”
I knew for this
piece i wanted to
make it have a
I came up with it deeper meaning
when i was than meets the
thinking of past eye
relationships i’ve
had with “friends”
and the way it
made me feel
explanation
This piece is made of clay, pressed plants, string, ink and paint.
You can see half a heart and half a brain being torn apart and
manipulated by two clay hands. This is a symbolism to other
entities trying to force a person to separate emotions and logic
(aka brain and heart) which is not great because without empathy
logic is useless is is also ill advised to rely only on emotions to
make your decisions. They are like 2 peas in a pod. On the left you
can see the variety of pressed plants i used to represent the heart
as growth, new beginnings and emotions whereas on the right the
brain is painted in ink to represent dialectics and reason. The
string is red to represent the essence of the brain and heart being
pulled, torn and manhandled by the hands which are purposely
dull and ill detailed to represent the jealousy and corruption that
others feel. The large item (the box) is clear to show the viewer
the transparency of people's actions and how everything always
has a second “face” or meaning whether it’s good or bad.If i were
to do it again i think i would pre dry the flowers because some of
them decayed and lost their colour (they were fresh and i had
done them the day before) and i would find more logic related
items such as paper clips to fill the brain with more
“knowledge”.Next time i will also practice proportions to make
the hands more realistically shaped.
 Detailed object sketches
Changes made
with annotations
Realism object sketch- lead lesson
starter activity

Though it’s not complete i

began sketching a pair of
headphones i had in the lead
lesson on monday.

( the inspo pic is at the bottom

right corner. Although my
proportions are not 100%
accurate, realism sketches are
not my area of expertise. With
more practice and time im sure i
will improve greatly)
Final Ideas
A closer lookMy first idea (and possibly my best)
was to combine the human form and
nature to create an ethereal style
piece. I used different mediums such
as oil pastel, paint,pen and charcoal
to see which would look the best.

I Think that the thermal style drawing

in the middle accentuates the curves
the best but the pose of the charcoal
drawing would be easier to sculpt out
of clay.

(on another note, my In my head the idea is to create

kitsch research page multiple sculptures of different
was ruined by some bodies and then surround them by a
water so i will be lot of nature related items ( ie
re-doing it after flowers,leaves,vines etc). I’m doing
module one is this to symbolise the beauty in black/
complete) poc women since i believe that they
are often underrepresented of
demonised in the media.
 part 2
I also observed different flower species and
analysed they’re colour palettes to help me
decide which theme would work best. Overall i
think i like the mexican marigold because of its
simple design but vibrant orange petals

Baby’s breath

Mexican marigold Sweet basil

 Part 3

My second design ide is less

favourable to me because i feel like
it has a less significant meaning. I
wanted to use multiple bendy and
stretchy items and cute them into
the shape of a ballerina to
symbollies flexibility of the mind
and body.
Transforming objects
The first object i
transformed was this The second object i
pot plate.I call it a transformed was a
reverse sea because seashell into a jellyfish.
the sand made of clay I did this because it
is crashing upon the reminds me of the
water made of melted beaches in seychelles
beeswax. This task was which is where i got the
quite difficult to do shell from back in 2015
because i’ve never
transformed objects
before so i was unsure
where to start.
Transforming objects part 3
For my third object i got an old
lightbulb and filled it with
packing foam,fairy lights, and
old christmas mistletoe to
create a diy snow globe of
sorts.I also decided to paint
trees of the beach to creat a
wintery backdrop but you can’t
really see them when the lights
are on.I was inspired by the fact
that christmas was only a few
weeks ago and it is my favourite
holiday. If i were to transform
objects again i think i would try
think of less generic ideas since
i’ll be able to practice
more/have more experience.
Additionally i will make more
complex objects such as a small
house made of toothpicks.